Mayor Eric Jackson stressed that employees would not be affected
TRENTON -- Trenton Mayor Eric Jackson, speaking for the first time about the city's payroll issues, said officials took immediate action after learning there was a problem.
The city's payroll company, Innovative Payroll Service, withheld payroll taxes from employees' paychecks, but never turned them over to the government.
The mayor would not specify the amount of money or whether both state and federal payroll taxes were involved -- "We believe it's just the one agency" -- but said he first learned of the unpaid taxes several weeks ago.
"Staff internally reconciling, looking at recordkeeping documents said something looked awry and began to look further and said to their director, 'Something doesn't look right here. We're finding some inconsistencies' and they kept elevating," Jackson said Thursday following an event at the Statehouse.
When it was brought to his attention, his administration double-checked to make sure there weren't any omissions or mistakes made by employees before meeting with representatives from IPS. The city then alerted the authorities.
"We took immediate action to make sure that we knew what we knew and what we thought what was going wrong, so at that point, we went to law enforcement and we put it in their hands," Jackson said.
The Mercer County Prosecutor's Office launched a criminal investigation last Friday, but the FBI has now become involved, he said.
Jackson stressed that employees would not be affected.
"We will make sure that all of our employees will stay whole," he said. "That's our obligation and we will absolutely do that. No employee will be harmed by this unfortunate process. I'm just glad we caught it when we did."
He said there was little he could disclose as authorities continue to investigate.
"They're doing their due diligence so I cannot get ahead of them and disclose what they're doing," Jackson said. "They will do that at their own timeframe and we're going to keep our own council and our community informed of that which we can as this process unfolds."
IPS has been put on notice and tonight, council will vote on whether to award an $130,000 emergency contract to Primepoint, LLC.
Cristina Rojas may be reached at crojas@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @CristinaRojasTT. Find The Times of Trenton on Facebook.